


Forfeiture of Freedom

by wings128



Series: Once Upon A Fandom Fairy Tale [4]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Beauty and the Beast Elements, Fairy Tale Elements, First Kiss, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-03
Updated: 2014-08-03
Packaged: 2018-02-11 14:13:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,462
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2071359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wings128/pseuds/wings128
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What’s more interesting than a floating flower?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Forfeiture of Freedom

**Author's Note:**

> Written for angelus2hot's prompt at LJ's Fairy Tale Meme: _Stargate Atlantis/Beauty and the Beast_

The architecture, or what was left of it, had been beautiful once. Elegant spires designed to reach towards the dual suns’ light stood out from the more utilitarian structures of the office buildings, and the grandeur of wide open plazas. A life once filled with vibrancy and colour, now reclaimed by voracious and unrelenting native flora.

To the four people making their way from the giant stone ring, it was a vista of defeat and bitter disappointment. Yet one more civilization they were too late to meet, make friends with, or learn the customs of.

“I have been here,” Teyla murmured. “Once, with my father, long ago - the great city of Sateda; home to Warriors, Poets, and Mystics.”

“No mystery what ended them,” Rodney stated, his words blunt yet incapable of hiding the physicist’s sympathy for a race he knew nothing of.

“Anything?” John interrupted the argument Teyla’s posture heralded.

“Minor readings coming from over there.” McKay answered, pointing south into the sunset without looking away from the small screen in his palm.

“Right, then that’s where we’re headed,” John put on his aviators and gripped his P90. “Teyla, you’re on point, Ford, you’ve got McKay.”

“Hey!” 

The team moved off after Teyla, as if McKay hadn’t spoken, keeping their three foot intervals with John bringing up the rear. It was a crisp blue-skied day and John wasn’t going to let anything or anyone ruin it for him – well, for at least the next twenty minutes.

Seventeen of those twenty minutes later they’d reached the location of the energy source. The place looked as if it was once a grand mansion, with manicured lawns, pampered gardens, and a sweeping entrance. Perhaps it’d been the residence of a political bigwig or ancestral family during the peak of Satedan society’s heyday – before the Wraith culling. Judging by the way the beige masonry was crumbling into the overgrown gardens, weeds were sprouting in the driveway like spider veins, and every one of the windows was minus at least one pane; it’d been some time since someone had been around to care what happened here.

Teyla had reached the top of the curved staircase with McKay and Ford at her shoulder, hesitant to breach the overbearing stained glass door without John’s command.

“C’mon, you know he’ll want to see if there’s an alien princess to rescue,” McKay urged with impatient eagerness. “The source of the readings is right there; and it’s of Ancient origin!”

“We will wait for Colonel Sheppard,” Teyla said as her gaze scoured the shadowy alcove for any hidden threats.

~^~

The cool mustiness of the dark high-ceilinged interior had McKay sneezing and complaining the moment the team crossed the threshold and fanned out; covering and clearing the immediate vicinity before returning to the ornate circular table in the centre of the room.

Unlike everything else here, it was highly polished, a deep honey caramel glow that reflected not only their faces, but the ethereal glow surrounding a hovering dark pink rose.

John couldn’t help the genetic pull that had him reaching out to touch it.

“Sheppard!” McKay barked just as Ford tugged on John’s sleeve to get his attention. “How many times have I told y-”

“Don’t touch the alien technology.” John finished for him.

Rodney sighed, “I swear it’s Kirk every time we step through the gate!”

“It’s a rose, Rodney.” John muttered, without taking his eyes off the luminous bloom.

“It seems pointless to keep a flower in suspended animation I grant you, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t dangerous.” Rodney returned his attention to the three inch screen in his hand. “These readings are definitely Ancient, if I could just calculate…”

John recognised the signs of a long tedious wait when he saw one, and signalled for Teyla and Ford to stay on comms while they checked out the adjoining rooms. ‘Maybe they’d find something both more interesting, and useful than a floating flower.’ 

~^~ 

He was on the last bite of his dehydrated fruit bar – Hostess Apricot Jubilee – by the time Teyla’s calm voice crackled in his ear. “Colonel Sheppard, Lieutenant Ford and I require your presence in the Library.”

John’s gut twisted tight; they were well over their time limit for things going wrong and despite Teyla’s polite and formal vocab, John could tell she’d run into trouble. Trouble that he’d be walking into blind. Trouble that meant he’d be leaving McKay unprotected.

“Go!” Rodney mouthed, adding both an eye roll and a dismissive wave for emphasis.

John shouldered his P90 and headed in the direction Teyla had gone before tapping his radio, “Ford, what’s your twenty?”

“Second right, hundred paces down the third left, Sir,” came the immediate reply.

Ford was a good kid, didn’t waste time when it came down to it.

“Hold tight Lieutenant.” John ordered, giving each room he passed a cursory sweep as he covered the distance between him and his team, and tried not to think about how he’d left McKay without back up.

~^~

John could hear Teyla before he saw her. He guessed it was her way of giving him a bead on their location, a chance at recon. A dark brooding rumble of a reply sent a spark of warning and something else firing down John’s spine; so the place was occupied – by squatters or looters or both.

He tucked his long body behind the jut of the door frame and peered into a room with an even higher ceiling that the front hall. Dust motes danced in the slither of sunlight from the curtained window that revealed bookshelves, whose upper levels faded into the vaulted darkness overhead. It was typical of Teyla to discover possibly the only remaining stash of knowledge left on this world, typical of John’s luck that it was protected by hostile locals.

As far as John could tell from his position, it was only one hostile local; tall, with dreads that scraped broad shoulders and arms built from battle rather than working out in a gym, arms currently holding some kind of handgun directly at Ford’s chest.

‘Right,’ John thought and kept his P90 at chest height as he stepped forward into the room, ‘easy does it.’

“Hey Teyla, find yourself a few books to read, I see.” 

“Yes, Colonel Sheppard,” Teyla answered without turning to look at him, her gaze completely focused on the huge guy before her. “Unfortunately, this man says that they belong to his family and we are trespassing - a crime that carries a forfeiture of freedom.”

“Imprisonment?” John asked, unwilling to be hung out to dry on a technicality.

“Yes, he says we are free to return to the gate, all but one.”

John thought of McKay back in the entrance way, and wondered if this guy knew there were four of them. ‘Chances were slim Rodney’d make it to the gate without being captured.’ 

“Sure, no problem, you and Ford head back to the gate.” John ordered, never taking his eyes off the guy’s soft brown ones, knowing any intent would be telegraphed there. “I’ll stay, and me and…”

“Ronon,” Teyla supplied. “Ronon Dex.”

“Me and Ronon can keep each other company.” 

John felt heat flush his cheeks as the other guy’s expressive eyes widened with surprised interest. ‘And this was why he let Teyla do all the talking, though there was no denying the guy’s appeal.’ 

“It is agreed.” Ronon’s growl of assent filled John with urgent heat, his cock instantly hard and desperate for rough handling.

“Teyla,” John’s voice carried a gruff edge and he knew Teyla could hear it, but she was too good at following orders, at trusting his judgement, to query it. “Don’t forget our stuff in the front hall.”

“Yes Colonel, I won’t forget.” Teyla nodded, her eyes meeting his for the first time since leaving to recon the building.

Ford was backing out the room, eyes on Ronon until he reached the door and saluted John; the slight tug on his mouth giving away his part in this ruse. “Sir, I’ll let your family know what has happened.” 

“I’d appreciate that, Lieutenant.” John answered, his trademark smirk in place on his full lipped mouth as he nodded in dismissal.

The front door slammed, the echoing crunch of bootsteps on white gravel fading as his team obeyed the weirdest set of orders John had given them yet.

And then they were alone.

‘At least until Elizabeth sent a jumper to rescue him.’

But when Ronon swallowed the distance between them in three long-legged strides, slammed him back against the wall, and drove his tongue hungrily into John’s open mouth, John found himself wishing just this once, that Elizabeth would take a very long time to weigh all the risks.

A very _very_ long time.


End file.
